The endless prison

"Ordog? Ifrinn?" Aiden mumbled, not understanding the meaning of the words. Even if he might have guessed that by 'Ifrinn,' the man might be referring to the land of two moons, but 'Ordog' sounded gibberish to him.

Looking at Aiden's expression, the man exclaimed, "You have become a vessel, without knowing the name of your lord?" He said again with a pause, "then again, for an inferior species like you, it is a blessing to be marked by us."

"Inferior species? Mark?" Aiden frowned," What am I to you,huh? A slave?" Even if Aiden was cursing in his mind, his mouth would not let those words slip.

"You don't believe me, don't you? "The man, looking at Aiden, smiled for a moment and ...

Everything around Aiden turned dark. There was nothing above him or anything below. He was floating in an endless void, without any sense of weight.

In front of his eyes, there was endless darkness. He opened his mouth, but no words came out. Aiden wasn't sure if it was cold or hot, as if his skin didn't feel anything.

Yet he could hear it all. The flow of air in his lungs, the sound of blood pumping from his heart, the sound of blood flowing through his vein and the grumbling of his stomach.

He could hear eyebrows meeting each other every time he blinked. It was as if he had a microphone inside. But he didn't worry about.

'It's just an illusion,' said Aiden. When he called for ESS, he received the expected response, and his attempts to circulate mana through his body became futile efforts.

'What are you trying to do? 'Aiden asked him in his mind. He was expecting a black-eyed man to answer, but he didn't. 'Even if you don't show me that I know you're too powerful,' Aiden said clearly, but nobody replied again.

'What do you want to do? Trap me here for all eternity?' Aiden cried out in his mind, 'Good. So do it. It's not like you can kill me...'

Aiden frowned as he calmed down his noisy mind. He could hear those sounds again. And his heart was the loudest of them all.

"One, two, three, four ..." he began to count. 'Seventy-two, seventy-three ... Isn't that just a minute?'

Nobody replied as Aiden sighed and looked around. There was no one in here. He didn't even know whether his eyes were closed or open. Without a sense of time, all he could do was count his heartbeat.

'1, 2 ...' 197, 198 ... 2486, 2487, uh ... 35163, 35164... What if he is thinking of trapping me here forever? I may have less than 13 days left before the shuttle goes back home.' The realization came a little too late.

'Why are you wasting your time?' Aiden could not help but curse himself. 'It's not like me.' Aiden wasn't sure why he'd accepted his situation, but he thought of a possibility. 'Can it be that he cast another spell on me, too?' Even if he did, Aiden didn't have a chance to know.

'I've got to find a way to break the illusion.' He knew that was his biggest obstacle, but he couldn't give up without trying.

'Mana beast's heart. Right, I ate a mana beast's heart that resulted in an excess amount of mana, but…' Aiden couldn't help but frown. He neither had mana beast's heart, nor he could control the mana inside his body.

'No, no, it wasn't the mana or the heart,' nobody could see the smile on his face in the dark as he contemplated, 'it was the pain that woke me up.'

Without hesitation, he put his hand in his mouth and bit on it. He could feel that his teeth dug deep into something, but there was no sense of pain or taste of blood in his mouth.

He was taken aback. This wasn't the result he was expecting, but he couldn't give up so easily. He punched his face, twisted his finger and even tried to bite his tongue, but there was nothing.

None of his actions had caused him any pain. As if his pain receptors were dead. He stopped after a lot more futile struggles.

'Why?' Aiden howled in his mind, 'How can this be done with a mere illusion? Even that sloth couldn't have done it. It is like the connection between my mind and the body have been cut-off.'

No matter how much he thought about it, he couldn't find the reason. Until… 'Could it be that I have been killed? No. no. no.'

He shook his head, 'That couldn't be. That mana isn't supposed to affect me. But… it's not like they can't kill in any other way.'

Even if it was hard for him to accept, he felt that it might be the truth. And the silence again shrouded his mind as he drifted into a starless space. His mind wandered around along with him.

For some reason, he felt sorry for his family. Even after trying so hard to earn so many credit points, Aiden couldn't deliver it to them. 'Aaron's going to miss me, Arya might be crying a lot.'

As he thought about his family, his chest was tightened, his heart was full of sadness, yet no tears came out of his eyes. Drunk in sorrow, Aiden continued to float in eternal darkness.

One hour, one day, one month, one year ... Aiden had no idea how long he'd been floating in the eternal darkness. Nobody knew how long it had gone before he stopped again.

Aiden looked around, but there was nothing in it. However, he couldn't do it when he tried to move his hand. It wasn't just his hand, all his limbs were bound by something.

A ripple appeared in front of him as he tried to fight, and a pair of eyes opened. The eyes were black, but millions of drops of light shone in it, making it look like a clear night sky.

"Your mind is stronger than I thought." Aiden could see no lips, but the voice within his mind had revealed the identity of the owner, "for an inferior species to survive within my domain for five minutes ... now I understand why Ordog had chosen you."

'Ordog? Inferior species?' These words were no longer surprising to Aiden, he was more intrigued by the word, 'Five minutes?'.

"Are you fucking kidding me?" Aiden cried his heart. There was a faint ripple in the eyes that Aiden had missed and the next thing he knew pain overwhelmed his body.

*Crack*

Aiden couldn't see it, but he could hear the sound loud and clear. The bones in his body were shattering like chips in his mouth.

Something was breaking his bones in one-inch pieces, yet he could neither shed any tears nor he could cry out loud. All he could do was to suffer in silence as the sound of broken bones resounded in his heart.

"Even if you are a little better, that doesn't give you the right to talk to me like that." That voice sounded again in his heart, "Tell me now, do you know Ordog or not?"

Nobody knew if Aiden had not recovered from the shock, or if he had chosen to ignore the question, but the sound of cracking resounded in his mind. This time, it was his other hand.

Aiden could not recover from the pain as the impatient voice resounded in his mind, "Let me ask you again, do you know Ordog or not?"

"No, no, no." Aiden cried out as soon as he heard the words. But the result was the same thing. It was the leg this time.

His breathing was ragged, his heartbeat was more than 150. All Aiden could do, however, was to suffer in silence. He had no control over his body. "Don't lie to me. The seed inside you is a part of Ordog. You are bound to…"

"There is a devil." Aiden cried before the man could end, "The one uses similar mana as you. She had a formless black smokey body and eyes that looked like red rings. I don't know her name. I don't know."

Aiden cried in his heart as he clenched his jaw to accept the pain. But it never came.

"You are a vessel yet you don't know?" the voice was confused. "Tell me everything you know about her."

Aiden had no intention of hiding anything from him. From the time he came to earth, he said everything. This time, however, the man listened patiently.

"Wow!" Aiden could sense his surprise from the man's voice, "To think an inferior species like yours were able to migrate to another plane without sufficient mana… What do you call your species? Oh! Human. I have to look for a few specimens of your species."

Aiden dared not to make a sound, let the man speak as he wished. Now that he had only one perfect limb on his body he didn't dare to be careless.

"Adi? It must be from the plane of Kert. To think those things came from such a long distance…" The voice continued to contemplate in Aiden's mind, but he was unable to understand most of them.

"So she must be injured. That is why she is looking for a vessel." The voice continued, "To think she would survive in this mana-less desolate land for so long, she deserves her reputation as a warrior princess."

Kert. Ordog. Adi. Ifrinn. All this stuff doesn't matter to him anymore. All he was trying to do now was to survive the ordeal. He looked back into the eyes.

Aiden shuddered a little as soon as he found those eyes focused on his body. "You should have said it all at the beginning." He continued with a cheerful voice, "As you told me everything, I'm going to let you know something good."

'You don't need to let me know, just let me get out of here.' Even if he wanted to say that, he dared not even think about it, fearing that the man would read his mind.

"Do you know why you're not affected by the void flame?" without giving a chance to answer him the voice continued, "it is because you have the seed of Ordog. You are a vessel of so-called 'devil'. And why she gave you that? Because she is dying."

"Well, it is not she who is dying, but her body is. So she's going to need a new body. Well, that's you. It must be the Ent, the one you called Adi, who had sealed your heart and the mana stone. "

"So as long as you don't absorb any other mana, the seed will sprout and you will become the next Ordog. To be precise, you are already halfway through."

"What?" Aiden cried out loud, "You are joking, right? There is no way that can be true. I…" Aiden could not finish the sentence as the pain in his last good limbs devastated his mind.

"I have warned you not to talk with me in that tone." And the eyes closed. And along with it, the pain spread all over Aiden's body.